Chapter 2
Darion
Ten years later
Darion stood in an antechamber of the temple, his father and uncles dressing him while the priestess chanted in the old tongue—words he only vaguely recognized.
He felt like a pup, raising his arms so his father could slip the tunic over his head, the white linen made yellow with age and the bright embroidered hem faded and beginning to fray.
It was the same tunic his father wore at his own courtship ceremony. And his father before him.
He tried not to scrunch his nose at the smell of it—musty, carrying just the hint of old sweat and wolfkin musk. But the corner of his father’s lips lifted ever so slightly as his gaze passed his face, knowing Darion’s tells all too well.
One of his uncles tapped his shin, and he raised one foot and then the other as the woolen britches were pulled up, the cord tied tightly.
“Lady Kyntha is a fine she-wolf,” his Uncle Norden said, as though he meant to convince Darion that this was a decision made for anything other than politics.
Mating the daughter of the Ironcoat Clan would end almost fifty years of bloody, pointless feuds over territory, slights real and imagined, and the thousand petty provocations wolfkin had always found reason enough to bleed for.
“Disciplined, sharp-minded… and she comes from a long line of fecund matriarchs.”
Well, there was another reason aside from politics, he supposed. The duty to reproduce was something all wolfkin knew well, and Darion hardly needed to be convinced of it.
“An alpha is only as strong as his clan,” his father often said. “And the strongest clans are forged in blood.”
His father, head of the Sabletails, had sired three children himself: his elder brother Eidan, born to a Solvekh; a daughter by the same she-wolf who had died before her first winter; and finally Darion, born of the Lurvekh mate who secured his place as heir.
Two pups surviving into adulthood was something to be proud of, even if that number was small compared to the litters his ancestors used to have.
But Darion would try for more.
The priestess chanted louder, dipping a stalk of hyssop into a bowl of moonwater and sprinkling it over him as she circled.
“Lur shae ta devaris. Porenth va nethra kol vekh, kol drai unorn.”
May the light of the moon cleanse you. Enter this ordination free from the bonds of duty and unfulfilled demands.
“Va koren thae,” he replied, having only memorized the response on the walk to the temple that morning. “Drai tharum-vekh.”
I come to you untethered by earthly obligation.
Karn, his other uncle, finished braiding his hair while his father wrapped a belt around his waist.
A gong sounded from the nave, and the doors opened. His father kissed him on both cheeks, and Darion followed the priestess out in his bare feet to officially begin the grueling sixty-day courtship, involving countless more ceremonies, rites, and observances.
His wolf prowled in the back of his mind, already bored and restless, also wondering why all the pomp was necessary.
Can’t we just breed her and be done with it? he snarled.
Darion kept the smile off his face. His wolf wasn’t exactly a romantic. Not that Darion was much of one, either, but at least he knew a thing or two.
He did, however, agree that the most important thing was to be mated and put some pups in her—the rest was superfluous. A distraction from the real work of protecting his clan.
The threat of the Ironcoats may have been gone after tonight, but the Bloodmoons still gathered strength to the west. And if the latest reports were to be believed, they’d already defeated and absorbed the Verdantbites, a small but old clan he was connected to by distant relatives.
They really didn’t have time for this.
He ducked under an archway not tall enough for his frame into a room filled with candlelight, another priestess leading the Ironcoats from the opposite side.
Kyntha followed in a dress made of silver, the seams tucked and pinched in a way that suggested they’d been taken in and out many, many times over the years, her generous hips swaying as she walked.
He smiled despite himself.
Fecund indeed.
And then he took in the rest of her—hair so light it looked like spun moonlight, eyes bluer than the sky, and skin the color of milk.
His chest tightened, and he no longer saw this union as a heavy onus. He could find pleasure here.
They met before the altar, crowns of juniper berries and flowering Myrtle stems placed atop their heads, hands out and open towards the oculus in the roof so the moon could bear witness and bless this first step towards their mating.
More words were spoken, and more responses were given—oaths to cherish, to respect, to reproduce…
With a mate as lovely as the she-wolf before him, that last one was an easy promise to make.
The gong rang again, and the priestess took her knife, slicing their palms to collect their blood in separate chalices.
Kyntha’s was tested first, mixed with powdered, bitter nightshade. A spark ignited, the white smoke that followed revealing the truth of her soul and intentions.
She came to him untethered.
Her gaze averted him coyly while he watched her and smiled, the priestess testing his blood next. He was so engrossed with imagining what she might sound like when he finally had her in his furs that he did not notice the red smoke that rose from his own chalice.
Only the shocked gasps of those around them.
Darion turned towards the priestess, his brow pinching. “What is it?”
With a heavy sigh, she replied, “You do not come here untethered.”
Now he was truly confused. Darion ignored the angry hisses of the Ironcoats as he reached for Kyntha, taking her hands in his.
They were cold and trembling, so he raised them to his lips. “I swear to you, I do not know which obligation I have left unmet.”
Her eyes finally rose to meet his, lashes long and fluttering as she replied. “I hear no lie in your words.”
With a smile, he kissed her fingers, and then lowered them back down as he turned towards the priestess. “So what does this mean?”
“It means,” she said slowly, bowing and holding out her hands to calm the growing unease in the small crowd. “That Alpha Darion simply has a debt he must fulfill before the courting can commence.”
Then she looked at him. “Best you resolve it swiftly.”
* * *
Once the Ironcoats had been properly assured this was simply a misunderstanding, that Darion had come with pure intentions and the fault lay only in his memory, the Sabletail alphas retreated to the Council Chamber at the castle.
Pitchers of ale and a platter of meats, cheese, and fruit were left on the table, the Solvekh leaving them to their privacy as they discussed the matter at hand.
“I am displeased,” Darion’s father said, his tone so heavy it nearly suffocated. “What debt could you possibly have left unpaid?”
Darion sighed, cradling his head in his hands as his elbows hit the table and he thought.
The clan could only be maintained through strict hierarchy, and unfinished obligations eroded the trust necessary to keep balance.
To keep roles defined. What good was the word of an alpha who never fulfilled his promises?
To be untrustworthy sowed division and resentment, and from there a challenger would grow and clans would be rewritten.
He only needed to look at the Bloodmoons to see what a change in leadership could wreak.
“I haven’t the faintest idea, Father,” Darion finally said. “You know I would never be so careless.”
The alphas sat in silence, until one of his uncles finally asked, “And what of your wolf?”
Everyone looked up at this, their faces turned towards Darion. The beast whined slightly in his mind and thumped his tail, like he remembered something.
But the only promise a wolf could make was to mark a human. The power carried in an alpha’s bite was capable of turning one into a wolfkin themselves, a bite that would then need to be confirmed as a man to bind them to his clan.
Clans needed Solvekh, or turned humans, to survive. Not just with numbers and bodies to fill out their ranks, but also with their wombs and seed. Even after turning, they were still more fertile than Lurvekh.
Had his wolf done such a thing? He was normally very conscious in his marking, choosing the strongest human men for their army. Those found on their side of the river who were brave—and foolish—enough to enter wolfkin territory on the night of a full moon in search of glory.
Glory that afterwards would be found serving Clan Sabletail.
The selection of Solvekh domestic laborers—she-wolves, mostly—he left to his uncles and father, while his brother Eidan refused to mark anyone at all.
He hadn’t even crossed the river before. Well, except for…
He gasped, sitting straight up.
“The girl…” he whispered.
His father raised an eyebrow. “What was that?”
“The battle ten years ago, where I nearly died… a human girl tended my wounds. I…”
The alphas groaned in unison. “You marked a child?” Eidan asked. It was rarely done, only when the parent was needed and they did not wish to separate a family. A child on their own, though, was irresponsible. “What were you thinking?”
“I barely remember doing it!” he barked. “I was but a pup myself, brought back from the brink of death…”
He couldn’t even recall the girl’s face, remembering only the halo of honey hair and the scent of the rags she’d used to dress his injury… slightly floral and sweet.
“This was ten years ago, surely we would have found her wolf by now,” Karn said, his arms crossed and eyes down on his cup. “The humans are quick to banish the made.”
“Bound to another clan?” someone suggested. “Or dead?”
“Then why would Darion still be indebted?”
The group continued to speak over each other, offering their own theories as to what could have happened to the girl—a woman, now—when finally his father held up his hands, the room quieting instantly.
“If the debt still lives, then so does she, likely among the humans.” He stopped, fingers tapping on the table as he thought.
“If she were first marked as a child, it stands to reason she had caretakers. Adult humans who could recognize the signs of a shift and keep her from the light. Half made, half formed.”
Heads nodded, murmuring their agreements. Wolfkin could only shed their human skin under the light of the full moon, which meant that if one were to stay indoors and keep all windows closed, they could, in theory, suppress the shift entirely and stunt the transformation.
But gods, at what cost? His wolf whined at such a thought.
“But she would not be invisible to wolfkin. Even hidden, her scent would have changed into something we would be drawn to.”
He looked at Darion.
“Find her, bind her, and ask the Ironcoats for their forgiveness over your youthful, indulgent mistake.”
Darion stood, fist over his heart as he bowed his head, not as chuffed as he thought he might be over the image of himself begging on his knees before Kyntha. He caught the smile before it bloomed on his lips.
“It will be done.”